'Urgent action needed' to recruit younger magistrates

MPs pointed to figures showing that more than eight in 10 (86%) JPs are aged 50 and over - and well over half (57%) are within 10 years of the retiring age of 70 - while the number of serving magistrates has almost halved in a decade.
The Commons Justice Committee also called for steps to increase diversity in the magistracy.
Statistics for 2016 show that 53% of magistrates are female, and 89% are white. While the latter figure is comparable to the proportion of overall population that is white, the report noted that many benches have no, or very few, black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME)... read more

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